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’24: Live Another Day’ – Jack’s in London but what else is new?

(image: Fox)

Jack Bauer’s back, and this time he’s going on tour!

24: Live Another Day series takes place in London, where US President James Heller (William Devane) is in town to negotiate a military presence in Blighty. When Jack Bauer (Kiefer Sutherland) turns up in the Britain at the same time, the CIA go into panic mode. After all, he’s been an international fugitive for the past four years.

As well as showing off some popular landmarks (Trafalgar Square and Waterloo), this 12 episode series was also filmed in some of London’s less salubrious locations (let’s not name names).

There are also a lot of British actors padding out the supporting cast. Colin Salmon plays an Army General; Stephen Fry is the Prime Minister; Guy of Gisbourne from Prince of Thieves is a hacker. There’s even a well-known Game of Thrones star playing a big baddie!

But despite its brand new setting and its fresh cast, some things never change in the world of 24.

Jack still has a ‘shoot first, ask questions later’ policy

(image: Fox)

This series takes place on British soil. Or at a version of Britain that’s apparently okay with the CIA doing whatever they want. In the span of a few hours, American agents fire off thousands of bullets. If this were to happen in real-life, the country would collapse into panic.

Everybody thinks Jack’s a terrorist…again.

(image: Fox)

The US government has branded Bauer a traitor on no fewer than 8 occasions. In every single one of those cases, Jack has been vindicated within hours, after single-handedly saving the country.

So when Jack comes out of hiding in Live Another Day, everyone in the CIA assumes once again that Jack’s become an enemy of the state. Will they ever learn?

Jack Bauer still has the ability to bend time and space.

(image: Fox)

We know from the original series that Bauer’s is capable of driving anywhere in Los Angeles within the space of a 3-minute advert break. Now that he’s in London, residents of the capital can get a first-hand appreciation of this.

In the second episode of Live Another Day, Jack drives from a hacker’s den in East London to a block of council flats in West Ealing. According to Google Maps, this should take around an hour. Jack makes the commute in 8 minutes.

Chloe O’Brien is back!

(image: Fox)

Everybody’s favourite sourpuss techie is just one of the familiar faces to return to 24. As you can see from her new wardrobe, Chloe saw The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo and obviously loved it.

Jack’s age is still a complete mystery… or is it?

The show has been a little slow to revealing Jack’s details: namely, his age. However, hints have been dropped over the years and we can probably give a reasonable estimate of his age.

Wikipedia lists his year of Birth as 1966, but that doesn’t add up with what we know about him.

In Series 5, Jack reveals that he spent 15 years in the US Army, after which he married Terri Bauer and had a daughter, Kim.

According to the show’s official site, Jack also graduated from a 4 year university before entering the Armed Forces. So from that, we’ll deduce that Bauer was around 37 when Kim was born. In the very first episode of 24, Kim was 15 years old, which means that Jack must have been around 52.

Years sometimes elapse between seasons (with season 7 taking place almost 4 years after season 6). Add to that the 4 years that passed between season 8 and Live Another Day and we can make a reasonable guess that Jack has aged 17 years since the pilot episode. That would make Jack Bauer…